Cycling after a few pints or cans, is it illegal?

tomasrojo

tomasrojo wrote: »

There was a case in Ireland of a person charged for behaviour on a bike getting points put on their driver's licence by a judge. Don't think it was related to intoxication, but can't remember the details.

Think this was it:
Injured cyclist gets driving ban for breaking red light

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/injured-cyclist-gets-driving-ban-for-breaking-red-light-2228117.html

(So, not penalty points, but a driving ban.)

I have heard of people being arrested driving a ride on mower while intoxicated,but never on a bike.

tomasrojo

Deleted User wrote: »

I have heard of people being arrested driving a ride on mower while intoxicated,but never on a bike.

The sorry tale of George Jones and his alcohol addiction springs to mind.

The first and most well-documented lawnmower incident was the late 60’s. George Jones was living 8 miles outside of Beaumont, TX with his then wife Shirley Ann Corley. Jones, who was born in Saratoga, TX just west and north of Beaumont, had already experienced a few #1 country hits by that time with the songs “White Lightning,” “Tender Years,” and “She Thinks I Still Care.” George’s success fueled his wayward ways with alcohol and he was drinking so bad, his wife Shirley resorted to hiding all the keys to the vehicles before she would leave so George wouldn’t drive to the nearest liquor store in Beaumont.

But that didn’t stop him. After tearing the house apart looking for a set of keys, George looked out the window to see a riding lawnmower sitting on the property under the glow of a security light. “There, gleaming in the glow, was that ten-horsepower rotary engine under a seat. A key glistening in the ignition,” George recalled in his autobiography. “I imagine the top speed for that old mower was five miles per hour. It might have taken an hour and a half or more for me to get to the liquor store, but get there I did.”

https://www.savingcountrymusic.com/george-jones-his-notorious-riding-lawnmower/

plodder

tomasrojo wrote: »

Think this was it:
Injured cyclist gets driving ban for breaking red light

http://www.independent.ie/national-news/injured-cyclist-gets-driving-ban-for-breaking-red-light-2228117.html

(So, not penalty points, but a driving ban.)

That's interesting (and surprising) that a driving ban is possible. Maybe, you can be disqualified from driving whether you have a license or not, but applying penalty points needs you to actually have a license and it needs to be allowed for in the law.

I like the quote at the end of that article though. Don't think I've ever seen an author say that about their own work.

tomasrojo

plodder wrote: »

I like the quote at the end of that article though. Don't think I've ever seen an author say that about their own work.

Yeah, pretty dry humour!

Eamonnator

CrankyHaus wrote: »

As referred to above intoxicated is a fairly high bar; not least as you have to be acting drunk enough to come to the attention of the Gardaí in the first place. You're unlikely to reach that threshold after a pint or two.

Injuring yourself is much more likely than any encounter with the Gardaí. A better question to ask yourself would be, is it safe to cycle home after this many drinks?

I had a drill instructor in Templemore many years ago, who was very very anti drink. He defined drunkedness as "the slightest departure from strict sobriety"

tomasrojo

Eamonnator wrote: »

I had a drill instructor in Templemore many years ago, who was very very anti drink. He defined drunkedness as "the slightest departure from strict sobriety"

From the point of view of a Garda assessing whether someone is drunk though, a slight departure from strict sobriety would be indistinguishable from, say, the high spirits in the morning of a gentleman who has been dissuaded from cycling home and spent an enjoyable night with the hostess of the party.

Laphroaig52

John Hutton wrote: »

... just have to be conscious to be patient and not take any chances at lights and junctions.

It sounds like you're a better cyclist after the few beers...

Wishbone Ash

tomasrojo wrote: »

The sorry tale of George Jones and his alcohol addiction springs to mind.


https://www.savingcountrymusic.com/george-jones-his-notorious-riding-lawnmower/

...or Alvin Straight and that great film "The Straight Story".

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alvin_Straight

CantGetNoSleep

magicbastarder wrote: »

i've heard of sporadic cases of judges applying penalties to cyclist's driving licences after being found guilty of a cycling offence. seems rare enough though.

They do breathalise in places like France, the Netherlands and Germany. Particularly in countryside villages where cycling home on a Saturday night might be a fairly normal thing to do - sometimes even completely off road on bike paths.

There is even a discussion on whether you should get a driving ban or not. Belgium recently reversed this feeling that it could incentivise drink driving in a car if the punishment is the same as on a bike (albeit consequences obviously worse)

Euro Fred

I always do when out on a big spin, if its pints in pubs or cans out of a garage

Nothing better than a can or two in Rathdrum during the Wicklow 200 or stopping off and picking some cans up before the finish of the Mick Byrne or Orwell Randonee

Ofcouse stopping for a pint or two in a pub like Johnny Foxes or down in Glenmalure is brilliant.

Keyzer

Lad I used to work with, when he found out he got a new job, decided to go out and celebrate. Got hammered, fell off his bike on the way home with no helmet and smashed his head off the roadside kerb. Died a few days later... left behind a wife and young daughter.

Regardless of whether its legal or not, cycling while drunk is a really stupid thing to do.

tomasrojo

Yes, cycling while very drunk is strongly associated with serious injury.

However, cycling after, say, half a litre of 3% beer is a completely different matter.

I don't really like cycling after having a drink, but I sometimes have a small drink. It's a who-give-a-**** level of risk.

CramCycle

Hands up I have done it on many occasion in my youth. Was it OK. Of course not. I remember one night leaving harcourt St. Unlocking the bike and riding off. A few minutes later i was back in Harcourt St. despite remembering reaching the canal. This would occur 3 more times. On my last attempt I dismounted the bike and walked across the bridge and walked as far as Ranelagh so as to be sure. After getting through Ranelagh I realised i was too drunk. I locked the bike up to a lamp post, flagged a taxi and was home a few minutes later. Traffic was light so the fare was minimal. I got up the next day and decided, not being 100% confident of the location of my bicycle but knowing it was near Ranelagh, to hop on the 11 bus , sit on the top flight and just keep an eye out. As the bus left my stop i seen my bike within 30 seconds. I was no more than 30 seconds cycle or 5 minutes walk from my house. I actually got off the bus further away from my bike than if I had walked straight to it. The taxi driver must have been so confused at my laziness.

micar

Cycled to work one Friday after a work night out.

Only had about 4 hours sleep and was still a little drunk.

A few mins into cycle, the head dropped and I almost fell asleep. The bike went in close to kerb. Very luck not to come off.

The shock made me cop on and to forced me to be fully focused for the rest of the journey.

Have not cycled that way since.

grape86

I stupidly did it once myself after a few pints in town., took my eye for off the road for a split second and ended up face planting the kerb causing 2 grand worth of dental damage...I was lucky it wasn’t much worse

magicbastarder

chap i know played a gig (as a DJ) for a new years party a good few years back, and was on the way home on the bike and came across a man lying unconscious in the street half wrapped around his bike. simon called the ambulance, and stayed with them - the bloke in question regained consciousness but they couldn't tell whether him acting strange was due to the knock to the head or drunkenness. or both. anyway, between hopping and trotting somehow yer man managed to get it together enough to ring his girlfriend (who was in beirut of all places), passed out again, and simon ended up talking to this poor panicked drunk woman who'd been woken up by her boyfriend's phone call, heard enough that he was in an accident, demanded to be put back onto him, with simon trying to explain 'uh, i can't' while trying to reassure the poor woman that all was in hand while she kinda lost the plot...

don't drink and ride, kids.

magicbastarder

another chap i know went for a couple of pints with the cast and crew after a rehearsal for a play he was in, and cycled home with one of the other cast members from the production. she lived nearer town than he did, said her goodbyes, and indicated and swung off down her road.

problem was she indicated left while he was on her left, clotheslined him, and took them both down in the process. no major damage done, but we did speculate whether it was a clumsy way of her showing interest in him.

I could drink 6 beers and walk a straight line or so my drunk self would have me believe but my attention span and concentration are shot to **** after beer 3.

In my youth I was famous for my homing instinct once I had enough, never on the bike though thankfully.

Forgetting to wrap the cables when putting new bar tape on and arriving into the shed the next morning and that ffs moment was as bad as it got for me in terms of drinking and cycling I think.

tomasrojo

I knew a postgrad in college who cycled into the back of a parked car because he tried to cycle home very drunk. Plenty of people had tried to talk him out of it, but I think he was very emotional as well after some relationship trouble, IIRC. He had a fair bit of scarring on his face afterwards.

buffalo

I left UCD campus one night a bit worse for wear. After unlocking my bike by the lake, I mistook the steps up for the ramp due to the shadow from some scaffolding. I'm not sure how I didn't injure myself badly, as I hit the step hard enough to dent the rim on the front wheel. Then the front brakes kept catching on the dent, so obviously I disconnected them for the ~45min cycle home. :rolleyes:

loyatemu

Keyzer wrote: »

Lad I used to work with, when he found out he got a new job, decided to go out and celebrate. Got hammered, fell off his bike on the way home with no helmet and smashed his head off the roadside kerb. Died a few days later... left behind a wife and young daughter.

Regardless of whether its legal or not, cycling while drunk is a really stupid thing to do.

there have been plenty of cases of people seriously injuring themselves while hammered drunk, falling down stairs, tripping over curbs etc. Getting hammered is inherently risky, bike or not.

Duckjob

loyatemu wrote: »

there have been plenty of cases of people seriously injuring themselves while hammered drunk, falling down stairs, tripping over curbs etc. Getting hammered is inherently risky, bike or not.

Yeah but your common sense should tell you that its not a good idea not to try to engage in something that requires high levels of coordination and balance not to damage yourself at a time when your coordination and balance is severely compromised by alcohol.

tomasrojo

loyatemu wrote: »

there have been plenty of cases of people seriously injuring themselves while hammered drunk, falling down stairs, tripping over curbs etc. Getting hammered is inherently risky, bike or not.

I think, as you might expect, falling down stairs is the most common cause of serious injury when intoxicated.

seamus

John Hutton wrote: »

That's interesting, I wonder what an impairment test is? Hardly a breathalyzer?

Chips Lovell wrote: »

From the same act:
These appear to be the latest regulations.

As far as I can tell impairment testing only applies to those in charge of mechanically propelled vehicles and not people on bikes or horse-drawn carts, etc.

A Garda can request that a cyclist take a breathalyser or perform an impairment test, but there is no statutory basis for it, and no penalty for refusal.

However, what that does mean is that you can be charged with an offence based on good old Garda opinion.

If the Garda decides that you are intoxicated "to such an extent as to be incapable of having proper control" and s/he is willing to stand in court and say so, then you're screwed.

On balance, if you were stopped you are probably better off asking for an impairment test. At least then you have a chance that the Garda might say, "Ah you're grand, go on".

Anecdotally though, Gardai tend to not to be too bothered with this stuff. They'll tell you to get off and walk, or scoop the bike and cyclist up into the car and bring them home before giving them a warnnig the next day.

Thinkingaboutit

There used to be a pub opposite Harold's X hospice. Saw a wobby lad get on a bike, who proceeded to wobble on his bike in front of a taxi, who made a timely stop as it happens to often in town. If the taxi hadn't been more alert, the lad would've gone direct to Mt Jerome. Even if a Garda doesn't take much heed, a bicycle should be no more than an aid to walking, something to lean on, if drink is taken.

Thelonious Monk

I did go through a phase where I'd wake up any my bike is just f*cked in the front garden and I wouldn't remember coming home. Yikes. Now I'll cycle home from the local after 4 or 5 pints, but it's only about a 3 min cycle and no cars on the road in a residential area. I hate when I go for one after work, leave the bike outside and next thing I know I'm 9 pints deep.
What I had been doing in this situation until covid was just bringing the bike on the dart and cycling the short distance from the station to home.

John Hutton

Thelonious Monk wrote: »

I did go through a phase where I'd wake up any my bike is just f*cked in the front garden and I wouldn't remember coming home. Yikes. Now I'll cycle home from the local after 4 or 5 pints, but it's only about a 3 min cycle and no cars on the road in a residential area. I hate when I go for one after work, leave the bike outside and next thing I know I'm 9 pints deep.
What I had been doing in this situation until covid was just bringing the bike on the dart and cycling the short distance from the station to home.

Fold up bike is your man, got very smashed a few times and got a taxi, bike in the boot.

The Noble Nudge

Only time Ive missed a pint is cycling by The Blue Light recently...

LollipopJimmy

Did it a while back, got on one side, fell off the other and lost my shoe, decided a taxi was best. Couldn't find the poxy shoe though